The church of Santa Maria Assunta, commonly known as the church of the Jesuits, is a religious building in Venice, located in the Cannaregio district, in Campo dei Gesuiti, not far from the Fondamenta Nuove.
According to some sources, the church was founded with the title of
Santa Maria Assunta dei Crociferi by a certain Pietro Gussoni or,
according to Doge Andrea Dandolo, Cleto Gussoni in 1148 and endowed with
land, water and marshes. In 1154 Cleto endowed it with a hospital for
the care of the poor sick, both men and women. Another Gussoni, named
Buonavere, relative and heir of the previous one, finally endowed it
with vineyards and other possessions in the districts of Chioggia and
Pellestrina.
In 1214 it was destroyed by fire but was quickly
rebuilt. All the goods of the Crociferi passed under commenda, this
complex was assigned to Cardinal Pietro Barbo (the future Pope Paul II)
and then to Cardinal Bessarion. Upon the latter's death, the Senate
tried to install the Franciscan nuns without following them, then the
Regular Canons of Santo Spirito (1481) and finally the Servants of Mary
(1498). In 1514 it was devastated by another fire and rebuilt again. In
1568 it was handed back to the Crociferi with the reform of the order
carried out by Pius IV.
Marco, another member of the Gussoni
family, took his vows in the Crociferi monastery, miraculously healed by
the then blessed and now saint Luigi Gonzaga. It is said that in 1601
Marco, surprised by a very serious illness, was instantly healed at the
invocation of the Saint. However, he died of the plague in Ferrara while
he was carrying out assistance to the plague-stricken on 1 August 1631
and was defined as a "man of supreme mercy". A portrait of him entitled
precisely Marco Gussoni blessing the plague victims in the Lazzaretto of
Ferrara, dated 1664, is present in the collections of Ca' Rezzonico.
Saint Ignatius of Loyola visited the city of Venice for the first
time in 1523 to embark as a pilgrim for Jerusalem. He returned there in
1535 with a group of friends who already called themselves the Society
of Jesus, and here he was ordained a priest. Two years were enough to
sow well in the lagoon and have a large following. He left for Rome in
1537. Due to disagreements between Pope Paul V and the Serenissima, in
1606 there was the Interdict (prohibition to officiate religious rites
in Venice) which resulted in the expulsion of the Jesuits, readmitted -
unlike other religious orders – only in 1657. In those years Venice was
engaged in an exhausting war against the Turks, and Pope Alexander VII
decided to give it the goods of the Crociferi, an order born to assist
the Crusaders and suppressed by this pope. Venice then sold the entire
donated complex to the Jesuits for fifty thousand ducats, consisting of
a church, a hospital and a convent. But for the Jesuits the old church
of the Crociferi was not large enough. So in 1715 they demolished it and
built their temple thanks to funding from the Friulian Manin family,
patricians since 1651. The new church was consecrated in 1728.
After the suppression of the Jesuits in 1773 the convent was used as a
school and after 1807 as barracks while the church became a subsidiary
of the Santi Apostoli until 1844 when it was returned to the
reconstituted Jesuit order.
The Jesuits in Venice identified Domenico Rossi, who also designed the church of San Stae, as the ideal architect to carry out the work they needed. It was not a simple task for the technician since he had to follow rigid schemes, which for the clients reminded the Council of Trent.
The facade, also designed by Rossi (and not as often reported by the master builder Giovanni Battista Fattoretto), is a free interpretation of the Venetian Baroque culture of the early eighteenth century. It is divided into two orders, the lower one - the greater - is marked by eight corinthian alveolar columns placed on high mirrored pedestals, of which the four central ones are in an advanced position to underline their correspondence to the nave. The movement of the facade is multiplied by the bundles of semi-pillars, slightly hollowed out, which welcome each column and by the division of the high architrave. The upper order, of four simple pillars without capitals, is narrowed to the width of the nave by large volutes and opened in the center by a large window. The crowning feature is the tympanum slightly offset on two vertical planes and surmounted by the dynamic marble group of the Assumption of Mary and angels by Giuseppe Torretto to which angels and adoring putti make a spectacular wing. The cornice of the first order supports eight statues on mirrored pedestals corresponding to the columns, which together with the four in the niches below, represent the Twelve Apostles, the work of various sculptors, some not clearly identifiable. The statues above the cornice represent, starting from the left, San Marco, San Tommaso, San Giacomo Minore (probably by Paolo and Giuseppe Groppelli), San Giuda Taddeo, San Filippo (attributed to Filippo Catasio), San Bartolomeo (attributed to Francesco Bernardoni, pupil and prosecutor of Giacomo Piazzetta), San Simone (attributed to Paolo Callalo) and Sant'Andrea. The statues in the four niches, on the sides of the portal, represent San Giacomo Maggiore by Francesco Cabianca, San Pietro by Pietro Baratta, San Paolo by Antonio Tarsia and San Matteo Evangelista by Paolo and Giuseppe Groppelli. The angels with thurible on the broken tympanum of the portal are by Matteo Calderoni. In recent times the work of Francesco Bonazza has been lost, a green and white marble drape, which was placed in front of the central window. Naturally the Manins, financiers of the construction, wanted to be remembered with their coats of arms in the ovals above the niches of the wings and in the wording on the architrave of the portal: Iesu ac Deiparae Assumptae Virgini / per quos omnia Patrity Manini. Also noteworthy is the door, one of the very few surviving originals, a refined structure in embossed and chiseled bronze sheet.
The plant is typical of the Jesuit churches, in the shape of a Latin
cross, with three chapels on each side in the longest arm. The
flat-bottomed transept and presbytery are flanked by two other chapels.
The six chapels on the sides of the nave are separated from each other
in small rooms, once dedicated to confessions. Between the second and
third chapels, the remarkable pulpit by Francesco Bonazza, and along the
entire corridor the "corretti", gratings from which the guests of the
convent looked out. The nave of the church narrows in front of the
altar, dedicated to the Holy Trinity, thanks to the presence of four
pillars that support the cross vault. From 1725 -1731 is the decoration
in two colours, white and green, of the marbles and floors. The bell
tower is almost entirely the one originally erected for the Crociferi
church, while the only structure dating back to the eighteenth century
is the belfry.
The ceilings are decorated with frescoes by
Ludovico Dorigny, Angels musicians in glory, dated 1720 in the
presbytery, The triumph in the name of Jesus, from 1732, in the cross
vaulted ceiling; by Francesco Fontebasso Abraham adoring the three
angels, and the Vision of Saint John the Evangelist, on the ceiling of
the nave, from 1734. The presbytery is surrounded by statues of cherubs,
little angels, angels and archangels by Giuseppe Torretti. Di Jacopo
Antonio Pozzo, also known as Giuseppe Pozzo, is the altar, which
consists of ten columns surmounted by a white and green dome.